by Cece Peters
“Together forever,” I repeated. Pinky swear.”
“I promise,” said Matty.
“I promise, too,” I replied.
CHAPTER FIVE
After picking up some sandwiches and potato chips at a local deli, I drove to The Roosevelt, arriving a few minutes before eleven to pick up Matty. Pulling into the parking lot, I was surprised to see him already waiting for me out in front of the lobby doors. Matty, like most boys, had not always been the most punctual during his teenage years; but I told myself that I needed to remember that we were adults now, and that both of us had matured.
“Hey there!” Matty said, jumping into the car and flashing me a huge grin. He was dressed casually in a pair of navy-blue golf shorts and a white polo shirt. It was a typical Midwestern June day; warm but not too hot. The heat and humidity typically came in July. “Oh look, we’re twinning!” he said, pointing to his shorts and the color of my dress.
“We are!” I agreed. “How many times did we show up at school wearing nearly identical outfits?”
“A lot!” Matty said, and we both laughed at the memory. Our friends used to tease us that we must have planned our outfits the night before to match.
“You hungry?” I nodded towards the backseat where the deli bag was.
“Duh, of course I’m hungry. Have you ever known me to not be ready to eat?” Matthew asked, grabbing the bag from the back, and plopping it in his lap to rummage through the contents. “Dill pickle chips! You remembered!”
“Well, I certainly didn’t get them for myself. Those things are disgusting!” I made a gagging noise while I pulled out of the parking lot and started driving towards my place.
“Dill pickle chips are the best thing ever. And they are hard to find where I live; everyone in California is on a health kick. They only drink celery juice and eat kale. I’m practically starving to death out there,” Matthew said dramatically while ripping open the bag and shoving chips into his mouth. I knew he would dig right in, hence why I had gotten him two bags.
“The smell of those things is almost as bad as peach schnapps,” I teased. “I can’t promise I won’t throw up in the car!”
“More for me, then,” Matty said, laughing and getting crumbs everywhere. “Oops, I’ll clean those up.” Matty may have matured in terms of punctuality, but he clearly still didn’t know how to eat without making a mess.
“Sure, you will,” I replied, looking at the crumbs and rolling my eyes. “Or I will clean up your mess myself. Same as always.” And we recalled me doing just that. Whenever Matty was over to my house, my mom always gave him a snack; and I then followed him around with the portable hand vacuum sweeping up the bits that he dropped on the couch, the floor, the stairs. Only half the food ever seemed to make it into his mouth; the rest went into the vacuum.
“So…. does Molly pick up after you back in California?” I asked in an attempt to make polite conversation about his horrible girlfriend. “She was pretty controlling back in the day; I can’t imagine she’d tolerate potato chip crumbs.”
“Molly didn’t tolerate much,” Matthew replied with a scowl. “Fortunately, that’s over. I broke it off this morning before she headed to the airport.”
“What?” I practically shouted. “Really?”
Matthew laughed, “Don’t sound so surprised. I knew she wasn’t a very nice person, and I also knew it wasn’t going to be a long-term thing. I figured it was better to rip the band-aid off now and get it over with. Helps that we weren’t going to fly back together. She will probably have moved on by the time I get home. Fortunately, our offices are on opposite sides of the firm’s campus. So, I should be able to avoid her altogether.”
“Wow. I guess…. I’m sorry?” I wasn’t really, but felt I had to at least make a show of being sympathetic.
“No, you aren’t!” Matty said with a boisterous laugh before continuing in a serious tone, “Connecting with you again really brought things into perspective for me. I knew if my Leah didn’t like someone, I should steer clear, too.” My heart swelled when I heard him say my Leah. I had forgotten how much I had missed hearing that. “But I guess we have to give her some credit as if I’d never met her, I wouldn’t have come here, right?”
“True. We’ll give her that one thing. But just that one. Nothing else.” We glanced at each other and laughed. I sighed, so relieved that Molly was out of the picture. I silently gloated at the thought of her dumped ass sulking on to the airplane; I felt bad for whoever got stuck sitting next to her as she would no doubt take out her anger on them. Molly had gone through boys in college more often than most people change their underwear. She was always the one who ended things; she was never the one to be dumped.
I turned the car onto my street, pointing out Krista’s house and explaining to Matty how she had left for Hawaii just within the past hour. She was flying into Chicago, where she was meeting her mom and sister; the three of them were then flying together to Oahu for a week.
“Krista single?” Matty asked, tipping the bag of chips so that the bottom bits slid into his mouth.
“Yes, single now. She’s had more boyfriends over the years than I can count. She really wants to settle down and start a family, but the dating pool around here is pretty small. I wouldn’t be surprised if she fell in love with some random guy she meets while walking along Waikiki Beach!”
“She was always looking for love, wasn’t she?” Matty asked. “And in all the wrong places.”
“Oh Matty, please don’t sing….”
Too late. “Looking for love in all the wrong places,” he belted out, his voice cracking at the effort. “Looking for love in too many places. Come on LEE-AH, sing with me!”
“You know I don’t sing. So, I’ll pass; thanks, anyway,” I said, cringing at the sound of his voice. I loved most things about Matthew Boyd, but his singing was not one of them.
“Still so uptight,” Matthew teased, tossing a chip in my general direction.
“You’re cleaning that up,” I said with a smirk as I pulled into my driveway.
“Wow,” Matty stopped laughing, his mouth gapped open. “This is your house? It’s a mansion!”
“Ha, not exactly,” I said, going on to explain. “Years ago, it was the home for the college presidents. After Lakeview purchased a new house closer to campus, this one fell into disrepair as the school thought they would hold onto it and eventually do something with it. They finally decided to sell it about ten years ago, and a local couple purchased it and brought it back to its original Queen Anne style but added all modern features inside. I loved it the first time I saw it. It looks just a dollhouse. The corner lot is an added bonus as I don’t have neighbors boxing me in on either side.”
“Anyway,” I continued, “the couple had just finished restoring it when they both ended up getting better job offers in Boston. They had to sell the place fast. I had just started looking, so I was the first to see it. The timing just worked out perfectly. It was an amazing deal. My parents had given my sisters and me some of the money they got from selling their house as they felt bad letting go of our childhood home; plus, they were planning on majorly downsizing, so I had a nice down payment. It’s way too much house for me, of course. But I just couldn’t pass it up.” I didn’t mention how I secretly hoped I would be able to fill it up one day with a family of my own.
“I’d be the perfect house for kids, wouldn’t it?” Matty asked, seemingly reading my mind and smiling at me before turning back to gaze at the house.
“Yes, it would,” I said quietly, trying to keep the sadness out of my voice. I was already thirty-two years old; how much longer was there for me to meet someone, get married, and to have kids? I stopped myself from going down that rabbit hole of emotions and refused to even think that maybe the solution was sitting right next to me. Do not get ahead of yourself, Leah, I silently scolded myself. Instead, I perked myself back up and got out of the car. “Come on, you can meet my dogs.”
We climb
ed up the porch stairs and I unlocked the front door, and my black labs were there to greet us. They had been attending a doggie day camp twice a week, where they were getting obedience training; they used to knock me down completely whenever I came home. They still rushed towards me, but I hadn’t ended up on the floor in a few months. Still, they couldn’t contain their excitement when someone new came over, so they both charged at Matty.
“Hi, guys!” Matty greeted them enthusiastically, getting down on his knees to pet and play with them. He’d been strong enough to withstand the force of them both jumping up on him, which was impressive as they both weighed over sixty pounds. “Oh man, they are great! What are their names?”
“Sadie and Jack; they are actually sister and brother. The local shelter found their litter abandoned in a ditch outside of town. They were two of eight puppies. I originally only put in an application for one, but when I went in to meet them in person, these two pretty much glued themselves to me. The shelter had already realized that they were bonded and couldn’t bear to split them up, so I ended up with two twelve-week-old puppies. They were quite the handful during their first year; it was like having two giant toddlers loose in the house. But they both just turned three and have settled down quite a bit. Well, except when they meet someone new, obviously,” I added with a laugh as I watched them playing with Matty. “These days, they sleep most of time, but they can also snap to attention if they think anyone or anything is threatening the house. They are good snuggle buddies and great watchdogs; they are basically my children.”
“Aw, they are so sweet,” Matthew said with a huge grin. “I always wanted a dog. But, as you know, my parents would not allow it. And now I work so much that I feel it wouldn’t be fair to have a dog at home alone all day. I’ve thought about getting a cat, since they can be on their own longer; but I would still feel too guilty knowing they were by themselves most of the time.”
“Fortunately, my schedule is flexible enough that I can walk over at lunch to let them out on the days I am on campus,” I said. “And I don’t venture outside of town too much, at least not further than Lincoln; they are never on their own for too long. They keep each other company; and they are good company for me, too. They’re sometimes a bit naughty, though,” I added, giving them a playfully cross look.
“Naughty? These two? No, never!” Matty continued playing with the dogs while I went into the kitchen to set our lunch out.
“Do you want to eat or take a tour of the house first, Matty?” I called to him.
“Eat, of course,” he answered, suddenly at the table ready to dig into his food.
“Eww, wash your hands, dude!” I practically yelled, not even jokingly, before he could touch his sandwich. “Do you know where those dogs’ mouths have been?” I started to lather up at the sink and Matty came up next to me to wash up, too.
“Still an obsessed clean freak, aren’t you?” he said as he bumped my hip to scooch me over. Memories of us in the same position but instead at the kitchen sink in my parent’s house flashed through my mind. As twelve-year-olds washing up before eating a snack after we had been riding our bikes around our neighborhood. During the spring break of seventh grade, when we had made a mess trying to tie-dye tee shirts. The summer between eighth and ninth grades when we wanted to earn spending money by helping my dad dig a garden for my mom. And all the times we would wash our hands before sitting down to dinner at my house.
“Being clean is my superpower,” I said, snapping out of my memories as we both finished washing up. “Now, what do you want to drink? I have water, milk, juice, pop.”
“Pop!” Matty exclaimed. “I haven’t heard it called that in years. Everyone in California says ‘soda.’ Makes it sound like they’re drinking Arm & Hammer.”
“Those Californian’s are just weird,” I said with mock seriousness. “We Midwesterner’s are right: it’s POP!”
“Yes, POP! Please, may I have a pop?”
After pouring our cola flavored pop into glasses filled with ice, we unwrapped our sandwiches and started eating. Matty inhaled his turkey club and was starting on his second bag of chips before I had even finished half of my ham and Swiss. We didn’t talk much as we ate, which was just as it had been when we were kids. There seemed to be an unwritten rule around food when we were together: just eat it and be done with it so we could get back to whatever we had been doing.
“Ready for the tour?” I asked when we had finished eating. I wasn’t able to eat my entire sandwich, so I wrapped up the remainder and put it into the refrigerator.
“Absolutely, I can’t wait to see this place,” he said, as I led him out of the kitchen and through the rest of the main floor, which featured a dining room, two room living areas (one casual with a television and one more formal, the latter of which I rarely used), and the sunroom at the back of the house. There was a sliding door leading to a sprawling deck; and I’d had a doggy door installed next to the doors. Since the back yard had a large fence around it that I kept locked, I felt safe with the opening as I wanted Sadie and Jack to be able to go outside whenever they wanted, regardless of if I was home or not.
The main floor also had a guest bathroom with toilet and pedestal sink. We ended up circling back around to the kitchen to grab our drinks before heading to tour the second floor.
“What’s behind that door?” Matty asked as I gestured towards the back entrance that led from the alleyway to the kitchen. He was pointing to an old door that had two locks on the outside of it. It was right next to the door that led outside.
“That leads to the basement, which I will not show you as I don’t go down there myself,” I said. “It’s a maze of concrete and is scary as hell. The former owners didn’t touch it; no need to as the rest of the house had plenty of room. They didn’t even fix that old door. I’ve never even seen the entire space; I went down with the inspector before my offer was finalized but came straight back upstairs after about a minute. I not only keep that door locked,” nodding to the locks on the outside, “but I rarely even come through this entrance into the house as I always park in the driveway and come in the front door. That whole little area just gives me the creeps.”
With our drinks refreshed and in hand, we walked up the wide staircase to the second level, where there were three bedrooms, the largest being the master with a walk-in closet and luxurious bathroom, including both a large walk-in shower and a claw foot tub. The master bedroom also featured double doors that opened to a spacious balcony that overlooked the garden, which was surrounded by the fence I’d had installed after adopting Sadie and Jack.
The two other bedrooms had good sized closets with a jack-and-jill bath between them. There was a fourth bedroom that had been converted into an office; the previous owners had installed dark wood built-in bookcases, giving the room the feeling of an old-fashioned study. The entire house featured lots of nooks and crannies, many with built in shelves. There were even some stained-glass windows throughout the home.
However, even though the home retained its original charm, the previous owners had modernized the place and built a laundry room on the second floor, moving it from its previous spot in the creepy basement. I honestly would have passed on the house if it meant I had to lug laundry up and down from the basement. Having the washer and dryer on the same level as the bedrooms was a luxury I knew I could never live without again.
Finally, tucked into the back of the second floor was a narrow staircase that led up to the attic. While finished, it was bare save for a few random leftover building supplies. I envisioned it as a children’s playroom and just could not bring myself to do anything else with it. Besides, there was plenty of room in the rest of the house for storage. As with the basement, there was really no need for me to use the attic.
“So, that’s the place!” I said, feeling a big embarrassed by how large the home was. What must Matty think of me living here all by myself? I’d always been so proud of my house, but I suddenly felt very self-consci
ous.
“Your house is amazing, Leah. I am in awe. This place is just…it’s just amazing!” I was flattered that Matty seemed genially impressed and gave no impression that he thought it strange I lived alone in such a grand dwelling. In truth, Matthew’s parent’s house had been around the same size, but it was modern and rather sterile. My parent’s home wasn’t actually that much smaller, but it had a coziness to it as it was lived in. Funny how three different properties of relatively the same size can differ so much.
I led Matthew back down the stairs and out the sunroom onto the deck, which wrapped around two sides of the house with a short set of wide stairs down onto the lawn. Sadie and Jack followed us out and began sniffing around. The day was overcast, so it wasn’t too hot. We settled into a couple of lounge chairs, which were set under a large patio umbrella; we set our drinks on the small side table between us and gazed out onto the garden, another leftover from the previous owners. I lacked a green thumb, so my mom tended to it when she visited a few times a year. I did some basic maintenance, which basically meant pulling a few weeds and just trying to not run over the flowers with the lawn mower. There was plenty of space for the dogs to play, although they quickly settled onto the grass to nap while Matty and I got comfortable.
“Leah?” Matty said my name quietly, turning his head to look at me.
I shaded my eyes and looked back at him, answering, “Yeah, Matty?”
“Do you regret the last night we were together before I moved?” My heart skipped a beat and I could feel my face turn red. Were we really going to talk about that? Now? I paused for a moment before gaining my courage. I had held back so much from Matty when we were younger; I did not want to make that same mistake again.
“No,” I answered slowly and quietly. I gave him a small smile before continuing, “Of course I don’t regret. I didn’t then, and I don’t know. I never have. Do you…. regret it?”